Self-Driving Cars are here: Implications for racing?

It might become another class of racing, like formula E, but I don't think it will ever replace a human being. No matter how advanced the technology gets, there will always be people that insist on driving themselves. I don't mind being on the road with cars without drivers. They will probably be more predictable than many of the drivers in California. They will be nice if you need to get some nap time on your way to where you are going. They have yet to tell us how decisions made by the A.I. will mesh with other A.I. units. I mean, if two cars need the same piece of road, how will the decisions be made as to who gets it? And there is also the question of do you program the A.I. to be a clean driver, or a dirty one? Sounds like the perfect project for BF to get involved in. That way, he could have complete control over the races, and turn control of NASCAR over to someone that is actually a racing fan.
 
Horse racing is still a thing because of Gambling. The format of 10 minutes races one after the other keeps interest in the spectacle. Take away the gambling and you don't have horse racing.

NASCAR doesn't have that gambling draw.
 
sloggie said:
Horse racing is still a thing because of Gambling. The format of 10 minutes races one after the other keeps interest in the spectacle. Take away the gambling and you don't have horse racing.

NASCAR doesn't have that gambling draw.
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Also, on the spectrum of prestige, horse racing and NASCAR exist at opposite ends in the minds of average Americans. Something like F1, similar in being something the "in" crowd likes to be associated with, may have a better chance of continued success.
 
sloggie said:
Horse racing is still a thing because of Gambling. The format of 10 minutes races one after the other keeps interest in the spectacle. Take away the gambling and you don't have horse racing.

NASCAR doesn't have that gambling draw.
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Interesting point. Gambling is probably the only reason we still have boxing, too. NASCAR does have the 'fantasy sports' draw, although not to the same extent as many other sports.

I don't see gambling getting any official involvement with NASCAR, even to 'save' it. I don't think I need to elaborate on the reasons it isn't permitted by most US sports sanctioning bodies.
 
There is gambling in some horse racing, not in others. Rio Olympics...

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dpkimmel2001 said:
Why anyone would want to ride in one of these things letalone watch them race is something that I can't comprehend.
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Every time I'm on the road for any length of time, I encounter and observe other human drivers who absolutely should not be allowed behind the wheel of a car. Whether they are incapable or just careless, our society doesn't even begin to take driving privileges seriously enough given the immense harm that comes from bad driving. Heck, I see Uber drivers and licensed commercial drivers that shouldn't be on the road. I can't imagine trusting these people over computers that will objectively be superior drivers in every way.

Look, I used to smoke cigarettes, and I romanticized that. I like driving, and I love racing. But if society moves toward driverless automobiles, I guarantee there will be a tiny fraction of the tens of thousands of deaths and hundreds of thousands of injuries that occur every year currently due to human driver error.
 
They've already had a problem with one of these. It was a manual transmission, and it didn't know how to drive itself.
 
A kid with a laser pointer of the right frequency can drive one of those cars crazy and cause it to lose control.
 
I watched a show about driverless cars a while back. They estimated they would reduce traffic accidents by 75% and I believe it. The thing is I don't know how they could work in rural areas with gravel roads with no lines or on snow covered roads where everything is white. If they ever do take over it will probably be the end of racing but that will be a long time from now.
 
Brigeton said:
I watched a show about driverless cars a while back. They estimated they would reduce traffic accidents by 75% and I believe it. The thing is I don't know how they could work in rural areas with gravel roads with no lines or on snow covered roads where everything is white. If they ever do take over it will probably be the end of racing but that will be a long time from now.
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Yeah, it takes a while for anything like this to catch on. Take hybrid cars for example. That's a nearly 20 year old technology, and still only around 4% of all new cars sold in 2016 were hybrids or EV's.
 
ToyYoda said:
Yeah, it takes a while for anything like this to catch on. Take hybrid cars for example. That's a nearly 20 year old technology, and still only around 4% of all new cars sold in 2016 were hybrids or EV's.
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It's also strongly suspected that most hybrid and electric car models aren't profitable at all and are sold only to meet CAFE standards.
 
I love driving...when there isn't traffic but I live in NYC and the traffic at times here can make you never want to step inside a car ever again. Between the morons on bicycles and the idiots walking across the street when they don't have the right away but they are too busy with their face stuffed in their phones to notice that they don't it's just horrible. Add the taxis and ubers and every other idiot that can't drive you have so many people around ya that have no idea how to drive properly it's insane.

So when it comes to self driving cars I'd be all for it as long as I can still manually take control of it if I want to or need to. I would still drive the majority of the time but when I'm stuck in traffic I'll gladly sit back and watch a movie or something and let the car drive me around.

Another great aspect could be long distance driving, now it would take me a long time to get use to sleeping in one of these as it drives but if I could hop in the car and go on a long drive without having to stay awake the whole time it sure as hell would beat flying of dealing with the stupid idiots who work for the tsa.

The last thing I wonder about is the legal aspect of all this. Who is at fault if it crashes? What if your drunk and you sit in the passenger seat and have it drive you? It's all very fascinating to me.
 
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